The Sick Infestation That Has Sydney Residents Worried

Newsroom

Posted on September 30, 2016
by Deirdre Fogarty

A sick rodent infestation has been labelled a "horror scene" by experts who say that there are "more rats than people in Sydney."

Stuart Jackson, who has been treating infestations for more than 40 years, told news.com.au that a combination of poorly maintained older buildings and an increase in incorrectly dumped rubbish has created the perfect storm.

"It has always been consistent, but there is an upsurge in calls particularly in the older suburbs like Surry hills, Haymarket and in the city itself," Mr Jackson explained.

"There's the old dunny lanes, neglected properties with inadequate waste control, poor hygiene standards and places where they dump their rubbish in plastic bags in the backyard.

"Plastic bags are no deterrent to a rat and the waste goes down a drain where [brown rats] live."

Mr Jackson, who works with Expert Pest Control, continued: "A lot of it could be easily prevented, but you have $2m to $3m properties in the inner city next to a rental where the landlord doesn't care and where there's broken pipes or tiles and the rats burrow underneath.

"And there are restaurants which just don't dispose of their waste properly."

Disturbingly, Mr Jackson described his "horror" at finding 50 rats gathered in an inner city restaurant's rubbish compactor room, before admitting to have seen rats running through kitchens and under sinks.

Professor Mathew Crowther, an ecologist and rodent plague expert from Sydney University, urged that the while the situation "could not be called a rat plague, there are more rats than people in Sydney and we have created the perfect habitat for them."